Commentary and analysis to persuade people to become socialist and to act for themselves, organizing democratically and without leaders, to bring about a world of common ownership and free access. We are solely concerned with building a movement of socialists for socialism. We are not reformists with a programme of policies to patch up capitalism.

Monday, February 18, 2008

Angolan Shame

Economic growth does not necessarily translate into improvements in child mortality, major new research suggests.Ten million children still die every year before their fifth birthday, 99% of them in the developing world, according to Save the Children. A study comparing economic performance with child mortality reveals that some countries have not translated wealth into improvements across society.

Angola comes at the bottom of a new "Wealth and Survival" league table drawn up by the UN Development Programme . There are few countries in the world where there are such stark wealth contrasts as there are between the wealth of oil-rich coastal strip around the Angolan capital Luanda, and the war-ravaged interior.

UNDP statisticians calculate that more than half of the babies who die in Angola could be saved were the country to spread its wealth more fairly.